the roses bloomed prettier than you
by audi katia
Summary: Sometimes she thinks she's yelling into a glass jar.


_Hello all! I'm so excited to be posting this. Quinn has always been one of my favorite characters and when I came up with the idea for this story, I knew I could finally do her character justice. Or, at least, I hope I do. :) F__or those of you familiar with my most recent story, Thursdays and I have a history., this follows the same sort of premise. This isn't a love story. This is a story about Quinn and her growth and evolution as a human being, how she is shaped by girls and women and how she becomes a woman._

_Just a note, this story will not, I repeat, will NOT follow season three. So, as of tonight's season premiere (yay!), this will be AU._

_I just want to say a huge thank you to my amazing, stellar, phenomenal, sensational, and all around wonderful beta, **L'esprit**._

_**Disclaimer**: I do not own Glee or anything else you may recognize._

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><p><strong><em>Chapter One: Lucy<em>**

_Once you have planted your rose bush, remove flower buds for the first two to three months. This will establish your new plant and, most importantly, encourage growth. After that period has passed, cut the blossoms with short stems to permit room for optimum foliage._

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><p>She's six years old and helping her father tend to the roses when it all starts.<p>

"Daddy," Lucy (because she's still Lucy at this point) says, chubby hands tight on the watering can, "why do roses have thorns?"

"To protect the roses," he answers promptly, not looking at her as he trims back loose branches.

"Are the thorns there to protect the roses from being picked or did the flower come along so that no one killed the thorns?"

He looks away, sweat on his brow and the adult expression of "oh, isn't that so sweet" on his face.

"Sweetie," he speaks slowly, smiling a little at his daughter's curiosity, "that's not really how it works. God made roses and thorns together so that it could be beautiful and safe at the same time."

He turns back to the roses, still talking about evolution and God's hand in creating the world, but Lucy just stares at the roses, waiting for her turn to water the plants.

That day she learns two things: God makes things beautiful, and even though her daddy talks a lot, she doesn't really understand what he's saying.

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><p>"Didn't she wear that shirt last week?"<p>

"She's probably too fat for her family to find many clothes to fit her."

Lucy walks down the hall with tunnel vision, looking only at the backs of shirts in front of her, the colors and prints blurring as she pushes back the tears. She tucks her elbows to her sides, barely feeling her hip bones through all her hated fat, as though the smaller she makes herself, the less likely their insults can hit her.

Tunnel-vision or not, she can't stop the older girls giggling nastily behind her with their steely laughs and silvery scissors in their hands. Lucy hears the dreaded _snip_ as a lock of hair is taken and her ears fill with screeching laughter and buzzing taunts.

Tears break the barrier of her eyes and stream down her cheeks. She's not succeeding.

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><p>Sometimes she thinks she's yelling into a glass jar. Loud and clear and shattering her lungs with every exhale, all gathered nice and neat in a pretty glass container. The sound reverberates back to her, smacking her in the face with the force of it, but the glass is just too small for her yells to be heard by anyone but her.<p>

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><p>Colored light streams onto the wooden pews as the summer sun beams through the stained glass windows. Lucy focuses on the periwinkle light cast by Mary's robe and imagines that's her voice.<p>

She sings in colors, pure and blue, bold and red, sweet and gold.

But then the organ quiets in the rafters and Sister Bernice halts her conducting hands. She leans in towards Lucy, between Lucy's mother and sister who are still with faint embarrassment. Lucy can feel the slight brush of her mother's sleeve against her wrist, more ice than comfort.

"Lucy sweetie, just because you can belt doesn't mean you always have to," she advises. Lucy watches the Sister's hands in favor of her face, shame burning her. The hands are soft, heavily lined with age in a grandmotherly way, and as they brush back the dark bangs from Lucy's face, Lucy feels all her sunlight colors fade from her mind.

"Let's try again," Sister Bernice says, addressing the whole choir before glancing her eyes kindly at Lucy, "but this time, with a little more subtlety."

They sing again in unison of harmonies and melodies, praising the Lord. Lucy sings soft and demure, trying her best to emote the message of God's love through her voice without further humiliation.

(Years later, Quinn forgets how to belt.)

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><p>Her sister tweaks her cheek, careful to avoid her nose, as she sweeps into Lucy's bedroom.<p>

"Hey, Luce, Mom says I have to braid your hair before we go to the park."

When Lucy winces, it's not because of the rough bristles tight against her scalp. She stares into the mirror, watching Fanny twist her hair tightly, pale fingers peaking through the dark strands. Her own face is small, scrunched with displeasure, overshadowed by her pretty sister above her. Behind them, she can see her gilded cross decorating the wall.

She hates being called "Luce." Loose women aren't ladies of God.

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><p>She counts the tiles in the ceiling, mentally recites the alphabet backwards in her mind, thinks of all the verses to Psalm 42.<p>

But the new epithet _Lucy Caboosey_ still manages to creep in through her ears, poisoning her thoughts.

Psalm 42 silences in her mind and Lucy imagines smashing the glass holding her screams.

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><p>Hair high and taunt in a ponytail away from her eyes, sweatpants encasing her legs, weights tight on her ankles, a stretch of trail before her.<p>

Lucy runs.

She runs longer than planned, hating and loving the burn in her body. The feeling tingles in her toes, coursing electric through her veins, through her extremities, until it pools uncontained and unhinged in her chest. Her ribs crack with each inhalation, muscles screaming with strain. She wants to vomit, wants to stop, but runs and runs and runs like the hounds of hell are after her. Black spots mingle with the growing yellow edges of her vision, like a shield in front of her eyes.

She's sick with the sensation, she's high, her body is thriving off the energy. Alive. Charged. New. Reborn.

Lucy runs until she's left all the bitter thoughts behind. She runs until her waist is thin and she can stand on the scale without crying.

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><p>Her mother drives her thirty minutes away to gymnastic lessons away from anyone she might recognize.<p>

It's the scent of sweat, mueller powder, and perseverance (it smells nothing like her mother's cooking, her sister's perfume, her father's roses) that greets her as Lucy enters the room, settles on the blue carpeted mat.

Her legs slide away from her, muscles tight and screaming in protest. But she pushes past her limit, inching closer and closer to some idealized dream with a fervor that would scare her if she weren't so focused on her mantra of _toned, slender, perfect_. She sweats out evil words and bitter memories, the recollection of hair being snipped away and pieces of her heart carved off.

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><p>With her new physique comes a new attitude from her parents. They applaud her efforts, admire her dedication, reward her with little presents. But for all their rosebud bracelets and barrettes, Lucy wonders if they ever understood why she felt so compelled to lose weight.<p>

She pushes these thoughts aside like she pushes the broccoli around on her plate, close to edge and avoiding contact, when her father speaks up at the head of the table.

"Lucy," he starts, voice jovial and smooth, "your mother and I are so proud of the steps you've been taking to be a healthier girl."

(Health had nothing to do with it, she scoffs behind her innocent gaze.)

"Yes," her mother joins, like it's her part of the script. "We can go shopping this weekend if you want, sweetheart. New clothes for a new you."

"Maybe you should call your sister; she can help you with new hairstyles. I know you like your ponytails, but maybe you could try something different?"

"Ooh, Lucy! What about dying your hair?"

"What a fine idea! How about it, Lucy? Don't you want to be a pretty blonde like mommy?"

The words settle down in the air, tired after a whirlwind of one-sided conversation. Lucy looks between the expectant faces, looks at her mother's platinum hair. So yellow and white, fine and delicate around her angled face. Is that what they want her to look like?

Lucy looks at her own hair, twirling a strand through her fingers and letting her hair catch the artificial light of their chandelier. Brown like dirt, but a little red in the sunlight. Auburn. Her father once told her that her hair had been kissed by the roses.

"I'd like that," she lied.

It might have been worth it if their smiles had lasted longer before changing the subject.

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><p>Early summer sun beats down on her, a little too weak to be sweltering, but Lucy can feel the beads of sweat forming on her forehead. Her father stands before her, heavily gloved and snipping away at the deadened branches of the rose bushes.<p>

He hands her another branch, another one, another one, until they pile up her in arms. The thorns prick at her, leaving little red scratches and maybe a droplet of blood. But Lucy bites her lip, thinking back on last week's sermon. Jesus had suffered all the pain in the world for their sins. Couldn't Lucy hold herself against some pain? Wouldn't she be a bad Catholic if she didn't?

With a sweep across his forehead in a typical _well-that-was-a-good-amount-of-work_ manner, he father turns around and sees Lucy's grimaced face.

He pulls the branches out of her arms, holding her in his concerned gaze as he asks her why on Earth she didn't say anything about the pain. She explains about Jesus and wanting to love her Savior and wanting to be stronger for her pain.

"Sweetie, you don't have to suffer. Jesus suffered for you so that you don't have to. Do you understand?"

She nods.

(On the rare occasion that Quinn actually looks back on her life, she pinpoints her only regret to this moment.)

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><p>It's like a scene out of a 1950s sitcom.<p>

Lovely housewife in her brightly patterned dress sweeps to the door as the suit-attired husband swings open the door with his briefcase in hand and a jaunty smile in place. The little blonde daughter (because she's little and blonde now; that's the only type of daughter allowed in the 1950s) stands on the staircase, smiling like it completes the picture. And it does. It's a perfect picture.

Lucy watches as her father announces his promotion, eyes gleaming and too many teeth showing in his game show host smile. She watches as he extracts a small black box from his briefcase and bestowing it to her mother, giving her a kiss and a pearl necklace.

The laughing, smiling, ever so happy couple turns their heads in tandem to their daughter, wondering what she wants to celebrate this joyous occasion.

"Daddy, can I get a new nose?"

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><p>(The hospital releases her just a day after the procedure with a bottle of antibiotics and a new face.)<p>

Her parents leave her in her bedroom to rest, but she spends at least an hour staring into the mirror. White bandage a stark contrast to the dark bruises under her eyes and around the battered structure of her face. God, she's going to finally be beautiful when it all falls away and leaves a perfect, straight, narrow nose.

Lucy falls on her bed, images of her future school pictures dancing in her mind, when she notices the Get-Well-Soon roses on her bedside table. She leans forward for a moment, taking in the sight and scent of the beautiful red blooms.

She frowns. The roses don't smell the same.

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><p>"Oh, Luce!" Fanny exclaims, ignoring her sister's involuntary wince. "You look so pretty!"<p>

The bandage is off and the bruises have faded, leaving only in their place that perfect, straight, narrow nose. Lucy feels again that sense of self-satisfaction as her sister peers at her with an unfamiliar look of fondness.

"You know what, how would you like to be one of the bridesmaids at my wedding?"

She says yes. It's expected of her.

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><p>Lucy. Loosey. Caboosey. Moosey. Juicy. Gruesy.<p>

"Call me Quinn," she says at dinner, eyes too innocent for it to be an order. Her parents nod and agree without a second thought.

Quinn, win.

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><p><em>Please review.<em>


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